In and Out of Ketosis

Nearly a week ago, I blogged about deliberately trying to knock myself out of ketosis. At the time, my ketones were extremely high and my blood glucose reading was 70, on the very low side of normal. More importantly, I felt yucky and thought that, for the sake of my health, I needed to increase my daily intake of sugar.

For the past week, I have indulged in a moderate amount of pineapple nearly every single day. For a day or so, I was out of ketosis, I believe, and only had a trace amount of ketones. But then my ketone reading moved back to somewhere between “small” and “moderate,” despite the fact that I was still eating pineapple. My fasting blood glucose was at 86, which was a nice middle-of-normal number. I felt better too!

We had house guests most of the week and things have been a little off. It was a vacation for my niece and nephew, so the family indulged in ice cream trips to Friendly’s, chips (in my house!!!), soda, and other junk foods. I stuck with Keto for the most part. (Still eating pineapple, so…) Until Thursday.

Thursday, I woke up feeling done. I was tired from being sleep deprived three days in a row. I had heart palpitations which I tend to have when I’m exhausted. I ate Keto for breakfast and lunch. After work, I ran tons of errands. At six-thirty, I helped my youngest daughter babysit my grandson. At nine o’clock, after over eight hours without eating a thing, I arrived home to find no one had organized dinner. Everyone was sitting around waiting for me to bring food! Pizza had been suggested.

I’m sure you can probably figure out what happened. My brother and I went to pick up pizza and I didn’t eat a bite of it. Haha. Just kidding. I ate three huge pieces of pizza and two pieces of garlic bread. It was a dream come true. So delicious. How could I ever have given up bread?

I fully expected to be sick after eating pizza. Instead, I felt generally okay, despite feeling bloated. I expected to gain weight – and, yes, I did gain almost a pound. (Some of that weight gain might be hormonal, though. It’s that “time.”)

Eating Keto was a struggle yesterday. The stress from the week combined with Thursday’s indulgence made it difficult to stick to the plan. I kept eyeing the chips and thinking about chocolate. I almost convinced myself that since I’d cheated the day before, I might as well satisfy all my cravings by eating a bag of chips and buying brownie ice cream. It really is true that one day off the diet can knock you right back into having all those sugary junk food cravings.

I tested my ketones this morning and I only have a trace amount, so I’m going to assume I’m out of ketosis. I’m also going to assume that I should be back in ketosis in a day or so, providing I stick to Keto and take it easy on the pineapple.

Sometimes cheat days are necessary. Sometimes indulging in junk is unavoidable when you’re in social situations or when Keto food isn’t available. Sometimes cheating is just something you want to do and that’s okay. Just bear in mind that cheating has consequences. Cheating will make you gain weight. It will knock you out of Ketosis. And, for many of us, it’ll take us back to square one in terms of cravings.

It’s okay to celebrate a holiday or special occasion with a treat. It’s okay to indulge occasionally. But, it’s important to keep in mind that the more we indulge, the more that behavior becomes a habit. The more often we cheat, the easier it is to find excuses to do so. Cheating comes with a cost. When we deliberately cause weight loss setbacks, it leads to frustration and dissatisfaction with the diet. And, that can lead to giving up. That’s the REAL cost of cheating.

So, how about the rest of you? Do you have cheat days? Is it hard to get back on track when you do?

from ketogenic-diet « WordPress.com Tag Feed https://ift.tt/2J8qSJn